


The Life of a Sky Captain

by Darkknightsrevenge



Category: The Edge Chronicles - Paul Stewart & Chris Riddell
Genre: F/M, Fix-it fic, Fluff, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Kissing, Sweetness, Wishful Thinking, daddy twig, family fic, loss of a child, loving family, multiple children
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-29
Updated: 2020-10-29
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:08:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27257689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Darkknightsrevenge/pseuds/Darkknightsrevenge
Summary: Twig is the captain of the Edgedancer, and somehow manages to be the fiercest captain in all the land and a caring father and husband. Maugin and Twig muse on their life in the sky, and the many children that inhabit the ship they call home. Just a little fluffy what-if for Twig's life.
Relationships: Arborinus "Twig" Verginix/Maugin (Edge Chronicles)





	The Life of a Sky Captain

A thirty-seven year old Twig stood on the bridge of the Edgedancer, looking out at his was well, and it was near dark. No sign of a storm anywhere close. Stickrot, the newest flathead goblin on the ship, was hopping around lighting the lamps.

Twig's green eyes fell on one member of his crew in particular, and a small smile crept over his usually stern face. Terrence, a tall lad of fourteen, was climbing up and down the sails like a treespyder. So young, but he already had the touch of sky sailing. Just like his father.

Twig watched as his son swung from the mizzen ropes like he had been doing it a thousand years instead of fourteen. Twig hadn't been able to keep him belowdecks, and nor had he the heart to. His son was born to be a sky pirate.

"We'll tie off for the night." Twig barked, and the others on his crew jumped to obey. The Edgedancer began to descend.

The captain of the Edgedancer watched amusedly as his son (In a perfect picture of his father) Grabbed the wrong rope, causing him to swing like a tree lemur across the deck, yelling his head off all the while. Terrence swung down, nearly hitting all of the crew before landing smack on his behind, right at Twig's feet.

The crew erupted in laughter, and even Twig couldn't keep an amused smirk off his face.

"Sorry Father..." Terrence said, running a hand through his messy brown curls. Twig stepped around his son, still smiling, and began to go belowdecks.

Halfway to the sky rock chamber, Twig was hit hard in the midriff by a small figure, who nearly knocked him backwards.

"Papa!" A small red-haired being squealed, knocking him the rest of the way over by pouncing into his arms.

"Oh, Madeline." Twig murmured, hugging his daughter close.

"Papa, Brick won't play with me..." Madeleine pouted, looking for the world like an eight year old version of her father. Twig chuckled at the name his daughter had given to her baby banderbear.

"If he doesn't want to play, don't bother him. You might lose a limb." Twig said in all seriousness. Madeleine screamed, then got off her father, who laughed in spite of his ringing ears.

Twig got to his feet and brushed himself off. Though he didn't often show it in front of the crew, his children were the most important thing to him. He now realized how hard it had been for Cloud Wolf to raise him all those years ago and often thought on how he wished he'd given his father a little more understanding in his youth.

The Captain continued down the hallway, then entered the warm sky rock chamber. Inside, he saw a familiar figured dressed in the bulky suit of a stone pilot. When she saw him enter, Maugin pulled some levers then stepped out the rear door into the pilot's secondary observation room. Twig followed, another smile creeping onto his face.

He got himself two inches inside the door before Maugin pounced, divested of her stone pilot's suit, and began pecking him on the lips.

"Darling." Twig said smoothly in a deep and somewhat sultry tone, his voice having deepened considerably over the years. "Your children are causing absolute mayhem."

"Just like their father." Maugin replied, tucking a bit of red hair behind her ear and then using her thin fingers to straighten Twig's blanket scarf.

Twig laughed, then pulled his wife deeper into his arms, dipping her down until her head nearly touched the wooden floor. He kissed her deeply.

The moment was ruined by two pairs of eyes peeking around the corner.

"EWWW!" The children shrieked at the same time. Twig looked up to see their ten year old twins, Tabitha and Mara. He shrugged, then went back to kissing his wife. The children were old enough now...

Maugin batted his shoulder playfully. "Not in front of the girls."

"Then let's take this somewhere they can't see... Darling." Twig said. Maugin laughed, and the girls shrieked again before running off down the hall, presumably back to where they'd been watching their little brother.

"It's a wonder we don't have more children than we do." Twig murmured, nipping at his wife's pale neck and eliciting a shiver from her.

"I think seven is quite enough." Maugin replied, patting her slightly swollen stomach, now visible without her stone pilot's gear.

"Eight." He said softly, bringing Maugin up from the dip. She curled into his strong chest with a deflating sigh.

"Yes, eight..."

Twig sighed. Their firstborn had been knocked overboard during a violent storm that had nearly lost him everything. Well, in a way, losing his first son had been losing everything. But the ship had recovered and his crew had lived to fly another day. But their toddler's loss had been why he had been reluctant to let Terrence above decks. All his other children were content below...

"Ah, Meteor." He mumbled his first son's name. It had come the brightest meteor shower ever recorded, bright arcs of light going over the ship as Maugin went into labor early.

His wife touched his cheek, the same memories running through her own mind, and he pressed a calloused hand to her belly as he squeezed her close once more.

"What do you think we shall name this one, darling?" Twig asked, trying to change the ton.

"Well, we have Meteor, Terrence, Mara, Tabitha, Madeline, Terra, Morin and Tasen..." Maugin ticked off. "What do you think about Meredith?"

"What if it's a boy?" Twig asked. His wife was convinced their next born would be female, but Twig wasn't so sure.

"We could call her Merida, or even Merrin. Perhaps Morgana?" Maugin continued, pulling him down the hall to their rooms.

"Darling..." Twig threatened, allowing himself to be dragged up to a point. He pinned her to the wall and resumed what he'd started with her neck and collarbone.

"All right, all right... Martin," Maugin surrendered, giving him access to the pulse point below her ear. "Or maybe - ah! - Maxin?"

"I think Martin is perfect." Twig said, capturing his wife's lips with his own. Maugin buried her hands in his long hair as they kissed languidly. As they finally pulled apart she gently traced a scar that slashed his eyebrow.

"Darling, do you think it could possibly be twins?" Twig asked hopefully, snatching up her hand and kissing the palm. Maugin gently swatted his cheek.

"I hope not. Carrying the girls was a nightmare during monsoon season. I couldn't look my breakfast in the eye for weeks." Twig smiled, then leaned down to kiss his wife once more before she shooed him off and moved to their room. He watched her go, appreciating the sway of her hips as she went.

Though he would never admit it to anyone, there was a part of Twig that would have been happily content to stay in a cottage in the Deepwoods somewhere, raising his children and taking care of his sky wasn't really the place to raise a family, but none of them complained. Soon he would be chasing his daughters out of the rigging and making sure his sons worked the sky rock correctly, and then he would never have any peace for worrying over them.

"Papa?" Twig's face lit up as their youngest toddled from their shared room, the shadows of the two girls who'd been watching him scooting away from their parents and little brother.

"Come here, Tasen." Twig said tenderly, holding his arms out for his nearly year-old son. The boy stumbled forwards on his still unsure legs until he fell into his father's arms. Twig picked his son up and began to pace up and down the corridor, rocking the little boy gently.

Maugin emerged silently from their room, watching quietly as her husband rocked their youngest son back and forth until he began to fall asleep.

Terrifying in battle and the best sky pilot and stormchaser there was, only herself knew how tender Twig was with his children. There was a whole other side to the captain of the Edgedancer.

Twig completed the loop of the hallway and turned back, eyes till fixed on his son. Maugin crept back inside their room, wanting to leave him alone. He had been such a devoted father all those years since Meteor was born early in the midst of that wonderful celestial event. He'd been so tiny and quiet as a babe, and neither of them much had a clue of what they were doing at first. She hadn't know that Twig was capable of such love and tenderness, really, since he had been abandoned by his own father for all those years.

But when Meteor fell overboard, Twig had searched for weeks, desperately trying to find his son, and after nearly a month, he was forced to give up. There was no way that a four year old could have survived the fall or the woods below. It had broken his heart, and the scars had never really healed. But while part of him was gone forever, he hadn't let his heart harden and had loved Terrence fiercely when he was born the following year.

The door slid open a few minutes later, and Twig came in carrying the sleeping baby back to his crib. After kissing his son's soft hair, he shed his coat and sword, then laid down next to his wife.

"I love you, deeply." He said before closing his green eyes. Maugin smiled, then smoothed one of his curls away from his face.

Twig was a wonderful husband, father, pilot and stormchaser. If that was the life of a sky captain, then so be it. She curled up next to him, and the family fell asleep, ready to awaken to another day above the Deepwoods.


End file.
